In this post, we are going to discuss what is meshing and why is it needed.
What is Meshing?
Meshing is basically breaking down a continuous body into discreet or finite elements in order to make it easy to perform calculations for the analysis of the body under different load conditions.
Why is meshing done?
Since continuous bodies have infinite degrees of freedom it becomes hard to solve the equations involved. Discreet elements make it easy to solve the equations.
How a continuous body can have infinite degrees of freedom?
For this, we need to understand how the load is applied to a body. Whenever a load is applied on a body it is applied through the point of contact, i.e., a point on the body. Now since a continuous body has an infinite number of points (a very large number beyond our count) the number of equations required to determine the results becomes very large in number.
Therefore, to reduce development time and get results close to the actual behavior of the structure or object meshing is used. As you might have guessed, this is the reason fine mesh gives results very close to the actual behavior as compared to big coarse mesh as the number of nodes tends to be closer to the actual number of points on the body as compared to coarse mesh.
How do discreet elements solve the above problem?
Well, when we mesh a body, we basically mesh it with elements, which we are going to discuss in next post. These elements contain nodes on which calculations are done, and the results are interpolated for the elements. Below is the sample image of an element.
The circles on the edges are known as nodes and the area enclosed is known as the element. The lines are known as edges. Refer to the below video for better visualization.
Meshing can be done automatically or manually, depending on how complex is the geometry and quality of the desired mesh. Automatic meshing involves generating mesh through algorithms based on criteria such as resolution, aspect ratio, smoothness, edge deviation, etc. Usually, we use a combination of automatic and manual meshing as automatic meshing may not always produce optimal results.
In the next post, we will talk about the elements used in meshing. Till then Keep learning. Don’t forget to follow my facebook and Instagram page for regular updates. See you all in the next post.